Our Wedding Video

So I've shared our wedding video with you once before, but you're getting it again. #sorrynotsorry

Hiring a wedding videographer was not something Ant and I agreed on initially.  Not that I blame him, but he was more worried about the additional cost we would be taking on, and not completely convinced it was "necessary".

I pushed the point a little bit, and convinced him to at least come meet with Max from Maxmotion Video with me.  Max had done our friends Jay and Marissa's wedding video, and they had only good things to say about him.

We met up with Max at a Starbucks halfway between us and him, and by the end of it Ant was on board TOTALLY on board.  Max was very low-key - in a way that we found very relatable.  He was no frills, what you see is what you get, and also very willing to work with us to make sure we were getting what we wanted.  His standard package is one fee that covers all day coverage by him with two cameras, a full day edit delivered on BluRay and a short clip delivered online.  He shows up during preparations and stays through the majority of the reception.  No hour limits, no strict schedules, easy peasy!  While we were chatting with him, he mentioned that he was just starting to offer one potential upgrade, to include a second shooter with him.  Ant & I left our meeting with him feeling very good about everything we had heard, and decided to hire him & Matt!

The day of, Max & Matt were wonderful!  They showed up SUPER early, before our photographer and even before one of our MUAs.  They were excited about the shots they were getting, and very personable with myself, my family, and all of my bridesmaids.  They stayed out of the way when it was appropriate, and jumped in to get shots they wanted when it made sense too.  I loved their creativity and am thankful for so so many of the memories they captured for us.

The final edited clip made me cry all over the place....and still occasionally does when I go back and watch ;)  It is such a small snapshot of the day, but captures the emotion and excitement in a few minutes so well. (and my dads speeches are notoriously tearjerkers to begin with)

The morale of the story: HIRE A VIDEOGRAPHER.

There are so many out there, in so many different price ranges.  Find one that works for you, find someone that you get along with, and hire them! and then thank me later :)

You can also view the video on his Vimeo site here.

xoxo

The Little Things: The Sparkly Stuff!

It has been SO long since I talked about my wedding details - I know our wedding was over a year ago.  But there are still so many pretty things to talk about!! 

Once the dress and the veil were chosen, the next step was getting the right accessories.  I've already told you about my long and exhausting hunt for my glacier beauties!  With the shoes and my belt chosen, all I needed was jewelry to match, so my mom, my MOH Melissa and I went to TWD for an accessory appointment!  I knew I was looking for bigger earrings, that would coordinate with my belt.  I tried on a few {gorgeous} pairs from Haute Bride - but they weren't quite right.  Then my mom actually pointed out a pair from Maria Elena Headpieces.  I put them on, and they were perfect!  They were big and blingy, but I liked how they had so many intricate details.    The picture quality isn't great, but I took this photo so you could see that they sparkled just as much from the back as they did from the front!  

My mom had commented before the appointment that something for my hair might be nice - so I asked the stylist to suggest a hair piece that would go with the look.  When I put this one on, Melissa and my mom fell in love and insisted I get it as well!  It was just enough extra sparkle to add some detail to my hair, which was otherwise going to be very simple, just curled with a little bit pulled back.  Here's all my sparkle together, minus the belt:

The day I picked everything up from TWD it was like a better version of Christmas.  I had my hairpiece and earrings, PLUS the 7 pairs of earrings for my bridesmaids!  That is a LOT of sparkle in one little bag :)

I loved the way all of my accessories helped tie my look together, and made me feel absolutely amazing on our wedding day.  

Originally, I wasn't sure that the hair piece was necessary... I didn't know how much you would see it and if it would really make a huge difference....but my mom had loved it so much I'd agreed to wear it.  Looking back - mom really does know best!!!  It was the perfect simple and beautiful addition to my look, and made a huge difference in some of my favorite pictures of us that day! 

How did you decide what accessories to add to your bridal look?  Did you pick them yourself, or bring friends shopping with you??  For someone who usually keeps my accessories to a minimum, I had SO much fun choosing these details for our wedding day!

xoxo

The Little Things: Gifts for Mom

With Mother's Day coming up, I thought this was an appropriate time to jump back into blogging about "The Little Things" - the details that made up our wedding day! Who knows, maybe this will spark some inspiration for you :)

When it came to our mothers, we wanted to give them gifts that would have special meaning, and be a nice reminder of our wedding day.  We knew we would be gifting them photos in the future, but that was after the fact - we wanted something to give them the morning of the wedding as a "Thank you" for all of their love and support leading up to the day.  

After lots of brainstorming and online searching, we came up with two different ideas!

First, we found Sarah Ku on Etsy! {Have I made it clear how much I love Etsy yet??}  She had beautiful and simple designs, and so I reached out to her about getting two custom prints done.  The first, for Ant's mom was a quote from "You are my sunshine" which has always had special meaning to them.  For my mom, we used a part of the poem that she would be reading during our ceremony by e.e. cummings.  Sarah did a beautiful job with the wording and watercolors!  Each one is unique and special, exactly what we were looking for!

For the second part of the gift, we worked with Kelley from Aquinnah Jewelry {now also on Etsy!} to create pieces for each of our moms.  She had recently posted pictures of new butterfly charms she had that I absolutely LOVED.  I had her make a gold butterfly necklace for my MIL, and silver butterfly earrings with pearl accents for my mom!

What did you give your mother on your wedding day?? Or if you aren't married yet....what are you getting mom for mother's day???  It is coming up in just a couple weeks and I am ALWAYS looking for good ideas for our mommas :)

xoxo

The Little Things: Thank You Cards

Todayyyyy, on this snowy lazy Thursday, I am chatting about thank you cards!  

For our wedding, I knew I was going to want to give everyone personalized thank you cards for everything they did to help and support us leading up to our big day.  I wanted something simple, and didn't want to have to go to 10 different places to get the different personalization I needed.  Naturally, I started with Etsy, my go-to for a lot of smaller wedding details, and found marrygrams!  For a VERY reasonable price she was able to put together a package of thank you notes that was just what I needed!  I was even able to customize the envelope colors to coordinate with our wedding colors!  I got 9 different styles, and used 4 different envelope colors.  Each one came wrapped up in a pretty little bow, and the quality of the cards was fantastic!  They were just what I was looking for....a harder, shiny paper with beautiful simple text - it let me do all the talking inside!  Obviously, the most special one was the one I got for my groom!

There are ENDLESS styles of thank you notes - depending on the occasion, season, person, etc.  I've talked about them before in, this post last Christmas I had been on the hunt for housewarming thank-you notes.  Below is another one I'd snapped to save - a beautiful striped thank you for a Mother on your wedding day from Sugar Paper, LA.  

I have learned to keep an eye out for good thank you notes, and I always buy them when I find them!  I've learned it's better to keep a few on hand, you never know when you'll have something to be thankful for!  A little personalized love can go a long way sometimes :)

In other news - as I mentioned today is HOPEFULLY our last snow day of the season! {and if not I may just never come back from my trip to the DR next weekend} Franklin and I were snowed in all day, and this is a quick recap of what a day in the life of us looks like...

First, we went on a walk with Dad before he left for work...

 We've learned how to climb the stairs, but then throw a 

fit when we realize we can't get back down on our own....

 On our second walk of the day Franklin ran head first into a snowbank, 

and was not a fan.  Mommy may or may not have giggled. a lot.

Were you snowed in today?? Or are you lucky enough to be somewhere where the weather is more reasonable??  If so, send warm thoughts our way please!!!

xoxo

The Little Things: Table Numbers

Ant and I are {hopefully} about to be snowed in for the next 36 hours or so!  So we are busting out the wine and I just put brownies in the oven, but before we start our mega Netflix marathon I wanted to share some more wedding details with you!

Early on in our wedding planning, I knew there were a few projects I was definitely going to want to DIY.  I don't think we did NEARLY as many DIY projects as Brittni - but I'm pretty proud of the few we did pull off!  Table numbers are definitely one of those.

Travel is huge for Ant and I - and we have been to so many fun and special places together.  We wanted to incorporate that into our wedding day in a pretty and fun way, and this was the perfect solution!  I combined a few different ideas I had seen around on pinterest and other wedding blogs - the image below is one example. {again - so old I don't have the source - sorry!!} 

I loved the simple frame with the gold numbers - and the way the backdrop was pretty but not distracting.  This gave me the idea to try it with black and white pictures as the backdrop instead!  We went to the dollar store and bought roughly a million frames, all 4x6 but all different styles, colors and designs. {and ALL $1!!!}  We then POURED through all of our favorite travel photos and came up with our top 20ish {not knowing how many tables we'd end up having} and printed them all in black and white.  We loaded up on gold and gold glitter spray paint, and went to Hobby Lobby on a search for numbers!  We found smaller numbers than the example above, which I thought were perfect.  The smaller number allowed you to see more of the photo itself, which was really the most important part.

Don't ask why we set this up inside in the living room....I don't have any good reasons.  But that's okay!  We took the glass out of a couple of the frames and spread them out in the living room to test the gold and glitter on both the frames and the numbers.  As it turns out, its a good thing we got the gold glitter, because the plain gold was very very dull.  The glitter added JUST the right amount of extra sparkle!

After testing a couple, we brought the rest out into the driveway one afternoon for a massive spray painting session.  I painted frames while Ant mowed the lawn! 

I love the way the numbers were small and subtle, allowing the picture to speak for itself.  For our sweetheart table we used a photo of Chaffinch Park, where Ant proposed to me, and I used a scrapbooking heart shaped punch to make the "number."  So perfect!

Our total cost for the table numbers, including all of the spray paint was less than $50....just the type of budget I was looking for!  I love how they were a simple addition to the tables, and gave each table a little bit of special meaning to us.  We wanted our table set ups to be very simple and clean, and I think they came out perfect!  Below are the photos our wedding photographer took that night:  Table 4 was Annecy, France...Table 3 was Geneva, Switzerland...and Table 11 was Florence, Italy. {This is also a sneak peek at our STUNNING centerpieces from Earth Blossoms!}

Of course, this was my favorite table of the night {not that we ever sat there}....my bouquet, our Kate Spade champagne flutes and Chaffinch Park for the sweetheart table.

Have you thought about DIY-ing for your wedding?  What projects in particular are you planning to tackle???

xoxo

The Little Things: Pearls and Pastries

TGIF!!!

This week started out nice and normal - work has finally slowed down after the holidays, and Ant and I have had a chance to get back into a slightly more normal routine.  We got to see my parents this weekend, and his mom yesterday...I caught up with my BFFL for a girls night on Tuesday - all sorts of lovely normal things! and then today happened at work.  and I'm ready for a TGIF relaxing night at home.  Soooo, I'm opening a bottle of wine and waiting for my husband to get home with sushi, and I thought I'd share something sparkly with you! 

Enter Pearls & Pastries.

I found her on instagram through my ongoing search for all things fun and wedding related.  I immediately loved all of the sparkle she has, and thought it would be the perfect little detail to add to my wedding day!  She often runs sales if you follow her - so one day when she was running 20% off, I ordered a hanger for myself!

When it came in the mail it was packaged with a pinch of confetti - so much fun! 

In the scheme of things, it was SUCH a small detail of the day, but when I look back at these pictures of my wedding dress it adds a totally beautiful touch! {also, can we just reflect again on those walls??? sighhhhh}

The gold was stunning, but if we're being honest.....this black and white photo is my absolute favorite.  Talk about timeless!!

I bought her standard hanger, but she has so many other fun options if you are looking to make your closet sparkle a bit!  Below are a few photos from her instagram of some of her other hangers for sale....never mind gifts for myself, I think these would make some amazing bridesmaids gifts!!  Who doesn't love some sparkle?  Or a personalized hanger just for them??

The little things may not make or break the day - but they sure do add some fun!! What was your favorite "little thing" from your wedding day??

xoxo